'Overwatch' hero Symmetra is getting a complete overhaul

Symmetra is one of the least-played heroes in Overwatch, so Blizzard is giving her a redesign.

In a developer update video on Tuesday, Overwatch game director Jeff Kaplan explained a host of different changes coming to support-hero Symmetra, which will be available to try on the public test region "very soon."

Blizzard will also be adding a new "Stay With Group" feature that allows players to stay with their teams after a match ends. It's meant to give strangers that end up playing well together a way to keep the good times rolling.

"The problem we were seeing with Symmetra ... was that she was a very effective character but she was viewed as overly situational," Kaplan said in the video, explaining that players often would switch off of her early in the game if their team lost the first point.

To make her a more effective hero in the competitive landscape of Overwatch, almost all of Symmetra's abilities are being changed.

Ultimate changes

The first big change is to her ultimate ability: Symmetra is the first and only hero to have two different ultimates. She'll need to build her ultimate like other heroes and will be able to use her Teleporter just like before, but now if you press the ultimate button again, you can drop a Shield Generator instead.

The Shield Generator gives your fellow teammates a shield while within a certain radius, ignoring any line-of-sight issues. The shields provided by Symmetra's generator can recharge just like standard shields, provided you remain in its area of effect.

It sounds similar to Lúcio's ultimate, Sound Barrier, but forces enemy players to find the generator and kill it. The intention is to make Symmetra a viable character with an ultimate that's more useful in team fights, which is something she desperately needed.

The Teleporter itself has received a buff as well -- it has more health and some of that health has been converted to a shield, so it'll regenerate over time. The Shield Generator also benefits from the change. This makes the flimsy, 200-health Teleporter and its new sibling harder to destroy.

Photon Barrier replaces Photon Shield

The Photon Shield wasn't well-utilized, Kaplan noted in the video, so Blizzard replaced it with the Photon Barrier.

Photon Shield gave single teammates a regenerating shield (similar to how Zenyatta's Orb of Harmony heals single teammates), which was difficult to manage and wasn't quite helpful enough to justify keeping around, in Blizzard's eyes.

Photon Barrier is a projectile barrier that works similarly to Reinhardt's Barrier Field. When Symmetra sends out the elliptical Photon Barrier, it moves forward on a set path so your team can advance behind it while avoiding enemy attacks.

More Sentry Turrets

Symmetra's Sentry Turrets have a maximum placement number of six, but in her original form she could only carry three at once and had to wait for a cooldown to be able to place all of them.

Now Symmetra will be able to queue up all six and place them immediately. There will still be a cooldown after all six are placed, but she'll be able to set up her nests much more quickly. The 12-second turret cooldown will be reduced to 10 seconds.

Via Giphy

Weapon tweaks

Only minor changes are being made to Symmetra's weapon. The primary fire, Photon Projector, now has a longer range at which it can lock onto enemies and start dealing damage, although it's not a drastic range increase.

"Don't panic, she's not a long range beam sniper now or anything like that," Kaplan said reassuringly.

With all these big changes, Kaplan is inviting players who test out Symmetra on the PTR to give Blizzard their feedback.

"We've had her in internal testing for quite some time now and she feels very powerful to us, so we'll see how she feels to you guys," Kaplan said.

Along with these changes, Kaplan reminded everyone that the new control map Oasis will be coming to the PTR soon -- after Symmetra's redesign is available to test.